"Hoping," mocked Alfred, "hoping for what, I'd like to know?"
"If your name was Chinky Mulvaney you'd guess quick enough," was Sally's retort. "I am hoping the Mulvaneys will get out of the city same as we did."
"Hoping won't get them out," said Alfred.
"Maybe it won't and maybe it will," Sally remarked. "I notice that when you hope for things hard enough, you're pretty sure to get them. That is," she added, "if you do some squirming too. Don't you know, Alfred, you can help things happen if you try. I've discovered there's more'n one way of hoping."
Mrs. Brown was ready to go out. "Sally, my child," was her parting advice, "hope all you wish, but please don't mention the Mulvaneys to Alfred or me for one week."
"She'd never live," Alfred said, as he grabbed his cap and followed his mother.
Sally flew to the kitchen. "I can talk to you about the Mulvaneys, can't I, Mrs. Turner? Now I am ready to wash the dishes. Alfred's gone to the post-office, and mamma has gone to sew for Mrs. Reuben Smith; that's why I didn't get out here sooner; I had to see them off. Mamma says,—what do you think?—that I mustn't say Mulvaney to her for a week. I can talk to you, though, can't I?"
"Indeed you may," laughed Mrs. Isaac Turner. "I feel as if I had known the Mulvaneys all my life. Talk about them, of course you may. Is Mrs. Mulvaney a nice looking woman?"
"Dear me, no," laughed Sally, playing with the soapsuds in the dishpan. "She's about as unpretty as any one you ever saw. She's cross as a bear, too, but who wouldn't be? Just 'magine, Mrs. Turner, if you lived in a horrid little pig-pen house, and you had seven acting children and your Mr. Mulvaney was dead, and you had to take in washing? I do wish they could come out in the country. I wish they could live in this very village. Why, Mrs. Turner, they are the most discouraging children you ever saw. There's Hannah and Chinky and Nora and Dora and Mike and Johnnie and Stubbins, and they all look worse'n they act."
"Yes," agreed Mrs. Turner, "I know them every one, Sally, just as well as if I had seen their photographs. Hannah is tall and thin; Chinky is red-headed and freckled; Mike is full of mischief; and Johnnie's always getting into trouble; and Stubbins is a terror. Now why do you want such a family turned loose in our pretty village?"